Download folder

[adalita]

How do you organise your downloads folder.  I am after a few ideas!  I am about to delete all 13.9GB of downloads.  

Do you organise by:
sites
date
creator

[UglyTownie]

I would recommend sorting by item category and sub-category first, with subfolders for sites/creators, and sub-subfolders for individual creations. You'll end up with a lot of folders, but I think it makes it much easier to find stuff than if you have everything just jumbled together by creator, say (tried that once, and it got really unmanageable). I'm still in the process of putting it back together too, but my own Downloads folder looks something like this:

Build Mode -> DOORS -> Site/Creator -> Name of Door
Buy Mode
Clothes
Defaults
Genetics
Hacks
etc...

Hope that helps.

[PegasusDiana]

I organize by category. Clothing, Fences, Doors-Windows, Rugs, Paintings, Furniture, Kitchen-Bath, Cars, Make-up(Make-up, skins, eyes, accessories all go in here), Hair, Misc(statues,clutter), Plants, New(for anything I add), and then I have a couple folders from creators I have collected a lot of stuff from. Then when I want to clean it up. I take out all folder and just put one in at a time. Go through each category in case something got in there I didn't want in there and clean it up. If I know it doesn't have recolors I delete straight from the catalog. If I know it has recolors I place it on a test lot first and delete all recolors. Took me almost 2 days to clean up 3.2 gigs so you have my sympathy in this quest. The make-up category I clean up in clean installer. After I clean up each folder I use Delphy's download organizer to find orphans or mesh's. With the new option things go to the recycling bin first so I can open back up the game and make sure there are not missing mesh's from the folder. If there are I write down the name and go to the recycling bin and restore those meshes. Then I empty the recycling bin. Move that folder out and put a new one in.

[adalita]

Thanks!

[PegasusDiana]

Your very welcome. I wish I could tell you an easier solution, but I don't think there is one. I've tried all the different methods and this one seems to work for me. Guess that's the price we pay for being downloadaholics. Still searching for that 12 step progam.

[adalita]

yeah i got 14GB.... I will keep my faves, but the rest is going!

[Kielen]

I've started using multiple game boots/Sims 2 folders so I have sorted everything so I can do fast syncs and backups.

Under Downloads I have the following folders...

Build
Hacks
Sim
Themes

Under Build, I have subfolders for each site, and then under those, a folder for each different set, etc.
Under Hacks, same as above.
For the Sim folder, I add subfolders for different things first, like Makeup, Clothes, Eyes, Hair, Accessories, etc. And then in those subfolders, I subfolder again by creator and then again by each set/download.
For the Themes folder, I just put stuff in that I only need for a short time, and that I won't use again. That way it's easily deleted when I'm finished with it.

So far, it's worked beautifully for me. Backups are a snap, and since I run multiple different Sims 2 folders for different things, I can sync up all my downloads in no time at all. I can find stuff, and it works great for finding bad files too. Hope that helps someone...

[adalita]

yeah it does thanks everyone!  Now if only I can get it to install!

[MaryH]

I've started to do something a little different, just to be extra cautious-and it only works if you have a secondary (but not operating drive-just a storage drive ) in your computer:
I've taken all the original unzipped files and put them into a folder named that-with subfolders; all the original houses, families, etc-so that if anything ever happens to the game drive, I have my downloads safe. I've also saved all of the game neighborhoods that I've played-by number of course, but with a descriptive folder title.
I learned this lesson the hard way-by losing the game drive, and having to have a new one put in-thankfully I saved almost all my downloads between the secondary drive and my old computer, which I'm keeping as a back up in case of the worst case scenario.
I know not everyone has this option, but it is worth having a second drive to just have storage for the downloads.
Someday I'll even burn them onto a CD if I ever get a burner into this computer..that's on the other computer!